


it's not safe in here, i feel a weakness coming on

by baliset



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everyone Is Alive, Gen, Somehow, also this takes place while rey is off searching for luke, it's better not to think about it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-30
Updated: 2015-12-30
Packaged: 2018-05-10 08:03:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5577637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baliset/pseuds/baliset
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kylo Ren has a hard time getting the hang of life in the Resistance base. Especially the mess hall. Finn and Poe take it upon themselves to help him adjust.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it's not safe in here, i feel a weakness coming on

**Author's Note:**

> It's a little self-explanatory, but yeah, this takes place in an AU where Han actually manages to bring Kylo Ren home and everything works out well on Starkiller Base and no one dies. Also, I am Such a sucker for redemption arcs.

The Resistance base’s mess hall is an overstimulating mess - too much noise, too many people packed in together, moving around in small masses to get food, to find somewhere to sit. Too many  _ smells _ . He’s used to taking his meals in his own quarters, but even when he visited the Stormtroopers’ cafeteria during designated meal times, everyone was eating in relative silence. Only speaking when spoken to, or when they needed something passed to them. The Stormtroopers didn’t sit with cliques, they sat with their units, eight to a table, each with the same amount of the same rations.

Kylo Ren - and he still  _ does _ think of himself as Kylo Ren, despite his mother and father’s insistence on calling him by his birth name - scowls down at his metal tray of food. He’s used to eating the same bland synthefood as everyone else in the First Order, not having a choice of eight different meats, fruits, and vegetables, and he hardly ever recognizes anything the Resistance members on cafeteria duty are serving. Picking whichever options look the most inoffensive has become his default strategy, if not only to move through the line as quickly as possible so that the pilots and technicians behind him don’t start grumbling about  _ why should we trust him outside of a jail cell _ and  _ bastard belongs in the ground not in our base _ . Thus, today’s lunch is slices of some kind of beige meat drowned in gravy, a damp-looking lump of green leaves, and a roll.

He’s sitting by himself, as per usual. The Resistance members give him a wide berth. Most of them think he’s there as part of some sinister scheme on the First Order’s part, not because he gave up and let his father bring him home. It’s annoying, but also validating, in its own way. It’s nice to know that people besides the Stormtroopers are intimidated by him. Sometimes Kylo Ren likes to make sudden movements near the pilots, or sneak up on them, just to see them jump.

Kylo Ren stuffs a forkful of beige meat in his mouth and lets his eyes wander the mess hall. A flash of orange and white draws his eye to a few tables away, where the BB Unit droid is rocking anxiously back and forth on the floor, between Poe Dameron and the traitor Stormtrooper. FN-2817. Finn. The two humans are bickering about something, gesturing vaguely at each other as best as they can with their trays and cups in hand. Watching them argue is fascinating - there’s no genuine anger behind it as far as Kylo Ren can tell, and he’s unused to seeing such amicable disagreements. He takes a bite of his roll, and grimaces as he finds that it’s as hard as a brick.

Poe Dameron must feel himself being watched, because he turns his head suddenly, looking directly at Kylo Ren.  _ Shit _ . Kylo Ren tenses, and drops his head down, staring intensely at his tray again. No better way to start a fight than silently observing the man who still has bruises on his temples from you torturing him for information. He swirls his fork around in his green plant-matter side dish, his cheeks burning.

“Hey.”

The voice isn’t Poe Dameron’s. Kylo Ren looks up and sees FN - no,  _ Finn  _ \- standing over him.

“You mind if I sit here?” Finn asks, a little stiffly, nodding at the bench on the opposite side of the table. He sits anyway without waiting for an answer, setting his tray and cup down with maybe a little more force than he means to.

Every muscle in Kylo Ren’s body feels locked into place. He’s sure Finn is going to threaten him, tell him he should have been left to die on Starkiller Base, warn him never to look in Poe Dameron’s general direction ever again. Kylo Ren has never in his life seen more appeal in being eaten by a Sarlacc than he does at this particular moment.

But when Finn does speak to him again, it’s in a neutral tone, and all he says is “you’re supposed to use the roll for the gravy.”

“What,” Kylo Ren sputters.

“Your roll,” Finn says. “You soak up the extra gravy in it, and it won’t be so hard.”

Kylo Ren considers this, and moves his roll over to sit in the puddle of gravy on his tray.

“I can’t believe you like that garbage.” Finn points to the green, leafy pile of vegetable with his fork. Kylo Ren looks up at him.

“Did you come over here to critique my lunch?”

“I came to keep you company,” Finn says bluntly. “I figure, we’re both adjusting, here. Besides, did you even taste that stuff? It’s disgusting.”

“It’s fine,” Kylo Ren mutters.

He puts a heaping forkful of the green stuff into his mouth and immediately discovers that Finn is right, but forces himself to chew and swallow it anyway. Finn laughs like this is the best thing he’s ever seen.

“You hate it! I knew it!”

Kylo Ren feels the too-familiar emotion of needing to smash something bubbling up inside of him, and clenches his hands into tight fists on the tabletop. “I said it’s  _ fine _ .”

“It’s okay if you don’t like it,” Finn says, suddenly serious. “You can go and get something else. Did you just ask for that because it looked the least weird?”

Kylo Ren nods. He knows in the back of his head that he used to have favorite foods, used to know what he liked and disliked in a meal, but it’s been so long since he’s tasted anything besides synthefood and water that he can’t remember. And he isn’t malnourished by any means, but the Resistance medic who checked him over for wounds and tracking devices when he arrived at the base warned him to ease into eating richer foods, or they’d make him sick.

“It’s overwhelming, I know,” Finn is saying with his mouth full. Kylo Ren has  _ never _ seen anyone in the First Order talk with their mouth full before. How many carefully conditioned behaviors has Finn unlearned in such a short time?

“I thought it was a lot of options, too, but at least Poe can - what’s up with you? Why are you doing that?” Finn interrupts himself, pulling a face and leaning in close to Kylo Ren, his eyebrows furrowed. Kylo Ren recoils instinctively.

“Doing  _ what _ ?”

“Staring like that.”

Kylo Ren makes a noncommittal grunting noise and drops his gaze back down to his tray, shoveling more meat into his mouth. He ignores the urge to apologize - he’s not going to, not to  _ Finn _ of all people, anyway. Kylo Ren doesn’t say “sorry” to Stormtroopers. Or reprimand them for their lack of manners, apparently. He wishes Finn would just go away - every second they spend interacting is a second that Kylo Ren feels increasingly out of his depth among the Resistance members.

“Look,” Finn says, “if you want me to go away, just say so. You weren’t exactly the friendliest guy on Starkiller Base, so the bar is pretty low here, as far as conversations go. I just always see you sitting by yourself, and I know adjusting to this place isn’t easy, so -”

“I didn’t  _ ask _ for your company,” Kylo Ren says through a mouthful of meat. Oh God, now he’s doing it too.

“No, you didn’t. I sat with you because I felt like it. That’s how things work around here.”

There’s no good comeback to that. Because Finn’s right. Kylo Ren doesn’t have the power to ask for anyone’s company anymore, or to send them away. And the only reason he has a lunch table to himself - a bunk to himself, even - is because no one here wants to come near him. Except Finn, for some reason. Kylo Ren uses his fork to mold his inedible vegetables into a small, mushy Death Star shape on his tray as he thinks.

Something heavy rolls over his foot without warning, and Kylo ren yanks it back, swearing. He peers under the cafeteria table. It’s the BB Unit, nudging up against Finn’s leg. It swivels around to face Kylo Ren and gives him a tilt of the head that looks almost offended (can droids  _ be  _ offended?), before turning back and beeping insistently at Finn.

“Hey, slow down, you know I can’t -” Finn protests. “He needs  _ what _ ? Wait - okay, yes, I’m coming! Give me a second, here, droid!”

He stands up from the bench, gathering his cup and tray and gives Kylo Ren a look that reads as unmistakably, perplexingly apologetic. “Sorry to cut this short. Resistance business.”

_ You could come up with a better excuse than that, _ Kylo Ren thinks, but outwardly he just pulls his shoulders up in a shrug. Why should it matter to him, anyway? He’s never been much of a fan of small talk. Not that many people in the First Order even had time to make small talk with him.

“But, hey, I’ll come back tomorrow,” Finn promises with a smile. “Maybe by then you’ll find a vegetable you like.”

Kylo Ren shrugs again. He watches Finn walk away and meet up with Poe Dameron in the middle of the mess hall, the two men clasping each other on the shoulder in a way that seems, somehow, more than friendly. They leave together, the BB Unit droid rolling behind them like an eager pet. It’s disgusting. At least, Kylo Ren knows that’s what he should think. No one in the First Order shows affection so openly like that, or goes out of their way to sit with someone else during mealtimes. Anyone who did would probably be reconditioned. But there’s something different bubbling unpleasantly in the pit of Kylo Ren’s stomach, something that isn’t disgust.

He doesn’t want to think about what it could be.

He picks up his roll, the bottom of it now soggy and dripping with gravy, and takes a bite of it. Finn was right. It’s much better than before.


End file.
